Insanity is not a disease; it's a defense mechanism.The opinions expressed here are disturbing and often disgusting to those with no sense of humor. I make no apologies for them, either.
Contact the Lunatic at Excelsior502@gmail.com.

Saturday, February 20, 2010

For those of you who may be new to this blog, there's a specific reason why it's called The Lunatic's Asylum. This will be pretty long, but bear with me; I promise, there is a point.

Thanks to nineteen Islamonazis with a death wish and an inability to get laid, I found myself under the nose of a hijacked airliner as it was deliberately slammed into One World Trade Center. Soon after, my life and behavior began to change in ways which, at first, were not very noticeable, but which eventually transformed me in ways I would never have thought possible.With the mental scars came the mental issues: Post-traumatic stress disorder, Anxiety disorder, Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, Clinical Depression, Agoraphobia.

Any of these on their own can be a terrible burden on anyone. To acquire them all at once can be overwhelming. Every day was a struggle to simply "hold on", as every waking moment seemed as if were to be the last. I walked a precipice all the time; I was in sheer terror every minute of every day, for no reason that could I could discern. I was hyper-alert at all times. Sleeping was a problem, and I could often go three or four days without sleep, until sheer exhaustion brought unconsciousness. Eventually, the pains began. A constant, dull ache in the center of your chest that grows worse or better depending on your ability to ignore it. Multiple visits to the Emergency Room, one of which resulted in Five Days on the Cardiac Ward, and no one could find a physical problem. I soon began to seek solitude. The smaller and darker the refuge, the better it was. Black curtains went up on every window in the house, and when a blacked-out living room or bedroom became too big and uncomfortable, I started looking for smaller and more-enclosed places in which to hide; bathrooms, closets. I could spend hours in them, always in the dark.

I would just call in sick for work. Sometimes, I might take an entire week off. I'd make up any excuse I could, and this inability to do what was needed to earn a living depressed me to no end: I couldn't work. I wanted to -- but I just couldn't leave the house; it was too dangerous out there, it made me too uncomfortable, I would get to the corner, and turn right around and run back. Leaving the house involved a complex ritual; I would place folded up index cards in my pockets and shoes, with my name, address and contact information on them -- just in case something happened to me and they only found my body parts -- at least they'd know who they used to belong to and next of kin. Then I started carrying my medical records in my briefcase -- just in case I wasn't dismembered but injured badly enough so as not to be able to speak. I had to plan my travel in such a way so that wherever I went, I would never be more than 10-15 minutes from a hospital. I would always avoid bridges and crowded places like train terminals or bus stations, if I could. It made going anywhere incredibly difficult -- I would be super late for everything, and if I couldn't adjust the route to fit all that criteria, I just wouldn't go.

It became too obvious to deny anymore, and I sought treatment. Treatment, unfortunately, came with a lot of drugs. And, Oh Joy! Oh Rapture! you often have to experiment with drugs, combinations of drugs and levels of dosage before you find a regimen that works for you. Which is always a lot of fun; especially when you pop a pill and five minutes later are literally bouncing off the walls with sheer manic energy for the next 24 hours, and to counteract, you get a really nifty tranquilizer which makes you nauseous, and they have to yank that away because you might puke in your sleep and choke to death. I went through four or five meds in combo, keeping some, chucking others, before we found the two that 'worked' for me (i.e. either knocked me out so I would sleep for 18-20 hours a day, or was capable of making me forget the pain and fear for an hour or two after I took it).

Eventually, I wouldn't even leave my own house...for anything. I pretty much didn't for the better part of three years. Three years in a darkened house, sometimes in a closet, always in the dark, I would only venture outside for food and cigarettes and to keep medical appointments, dodging from tree to tree, and trying to avoid being seen, as if I were a soldier in some kind of house-house fight. There was the one time when I took a really bold leap and decided that staying in New York City -- with all of it's reminders of 9/11 -- was a living Hell; I drugged myself up (lots of Zoloft, lots of Xanax, and lots and lots of Absolut) and moved to Charlotte, North Carolina. I needed to leave the Big Apple, my birthplace, the place where all my friends and family were, something fierce. I felt I would have died if I hadn't.

It didn't work out the way I had planned it, mostly because I wasn't a well man. I probably did more damage to myself, but that's par for the course with some of these issues; you hit absolute rock-bottom, often painfully. You know what you're doing, you know what not to do, but you can't stop yourself. Things got awfully bad: I was even homeless for a spell, and the only thing left to do was to come back to New York. My family had never understood what was happening to me(that's fairly a common phenomenon), and was never much of a support (but that's my problem) -- but they were all I had left.

And then I vegetated for another couple of years.

In the meantime, my career was ruined. Even if I could get over the mental issues, I had been out of work for a couple of years, and in an industry where currency is everything, that's not good. Also, technology has advanced, and there was a reduced need for manpower. What jobs were left in the field were being shipped overseas, or being moved to godawful places like North Dakota and Delaware. It didn't help that I was brutally honest about why I had been out of work for so long; see how many second interviews you get when you tell people you've been treated for a mental illness. The insurance money ran out, and then my money ran out, and I owe everyone on the planet, it seems. I'll probably never get out from under my debts. I can forget paying for more schooling to get those "qualifications" everyone wants. I'm chronically unemployed, and the jobs that I do find never last for very long; I either get frustrated and quit because it isn't what I want to do, or I find something I want to do, but they don't need me permanently. Full-time employment is almost impossible to get: I could do most any job I set my mind to do, but nowadays people want qualifications up the ying-yang, which is not so much a way to get the best qualified people as much as it is to discourage minorities from interviewing for jobs they aren't going to get in the first place and then filing discrimination lawsuits when they don't get them.

It's a constant battle, trying to sort yourself out when you're laboring with these sorts of problems. But, I've been working on them for years now, one thing at a time. I started on the PTSD and Anxiety first; haven't had a panic attack or a nightmare involving airliners and flaming cityscapes for a good long while now. Then the Agoraphobia -- started getting out more, walking, playing with my nephews, eventually, getting up the nerve to get on public transportation or cross bridges again. The OCD? Getting somewhat better, and I don't carry a briefcase with medical records anymore, nor do I use hospitals as waypoints. I do, occasionally, need to "hide", but that's not a response to anxiety anymore; it's more a matter of comfort -- when I need to relax, I want to do it in solitude and quiet, and you could say "I've come out of the closet"...

Depression, however, is the killer. If there was ever anything you might wish to inflict on a blood enemy, someone you truly despised and detested and wanted to inflict the worst upon, then pray they get stricken with Depression. It is truly a paralyzer. It can often put a person in a state of complete and utter inertia. It saps the will, it breaks the spirit, it is perhaps the Worst Thing Ever Created. You, the person gradually disappear, one piece at a time falling into a pit of dark despair, a little more of you gone today, another tomorrow. And you can't stop it, even as you're totally aware it is happening. The really amazing -- and truly-frightening thing -- about it all, is that it's your own mind that does it all to you. The Human Mind is perhaps the most dangerous weapon in existence. You are under a constant assault from yourself. Your brain doesn't 'shut off', and you are compelled to relive the same traumas, the same mistakes, the same issues over and over again, and each time the process starts, you become even less of a person. It takes everything that is YOU and eats away at it like acid. You start to feel hollow, aimless, with no ambition, no apparent purpose. Some people fall in deep enough to kill themselves, some -- like the guy who crashed his pane into the IRS building this past week --decide to take others with them.

For me, it was matter of getting the right information,and figuring out what was happening to me. The physical symptoms, understanding the mechanisms and symptomology, learning what the disease was, what it did, and why it happens. I'm better now, much better, but the depression always comes back. It makes me angry, it makes me bitter, it makes me snarky and sarcastic.

And you get to read it. It's like another form of Tourette's Syndrome. Go back and look at some older posts, and you'll see the effects of mental illness, drinking, SSRI's and plain old CRAZY have had over the years.

Anyways, the battle against any of these things is never truly "won". You may be able to control your symptoms for a while, maybe even many years, but at some point in your life these things will return to haunt you again. They never go away. You will need to learn to live by different rules so that your issues don't consume you. Often, this means changes that are difficult and painful, and result in you losing some of the things, activities and people that meant something to you.

You just have to be able to throw things away. You have to be able to say "No, I don't want to keep this, it's not worth having", because if you don't, you're dead. There is only one destination at the end of Depression and so you have to go out and do what must be done to see that doesn't happen -- confront the problem, solve the problem -- do whatever you need to do.

Recently, I have been extremely nasty on the subject of religion. It has upset some readers, who have found my comments extremely rude and demeaning. Those comments cannot be taken back, and they won't be; I still believe religion is a crock and has created more problems than it has ever solved, but I could have been a lot more careful and respectful in how I expressed my feelings on the subject (it's funny, however, how those who complained the most apparently had no problem when I was having a go at Islam -- it's only when I start talking about Other Invisible Man from the Desert that they all get their noses out of joint, but that's a post for another day).

So, I apologize to you Bible Thumpers, but NOT for what was said -- only for it's condescending and insulting tone. I will now confront my issues with religion, and hopefully I will overcome them, probably by ignoring them. I can promise you that it won't, as some have suggested, involve me getting washed in the blood of the lamb or me doing any praying. It'll be more in the vein of figuring out just why it is that I'm hostile to the very idea of faith. When I get the answer, I'll post it here, and another of my great internal battles -- the Question of "Does God exist, and if so, why is She such a Cast-Iron Bitch?" might finally be answered, and I will be one step closer to the goal of complete sanity.

Wait a minute, I think I have it!Maybe it was becausefaithis what motivated nineteen morons to do something so savage that it has ruined my life that has given me the idea that not only is faith dangerous, when placed in the hands of mouth-breathing morons, it's downright deadly. You can keep your extremely-twisted explanations about "mysterious plans"and how even a "Loving God" can allow 3,000 murders (Hell, She allowed the Holocaust, didn't She? September 11th must have been Bush League to Her, right?), or how such a thoughtful and caring deity could even invent, and then inflict, things like PTSD and Clinical Depression on those It loves; that's pretty fucking sadistic. Maybe it could explain how my being deprived of my sanity, nine years of my life, my career, my fortune, my property, a lot of good women and good friends, is supposed to make me a better person or bringing some benefit to the world?

Perhaps having my brain chemistry possibly altered by ever-increasing dosages of drugs who's ultimate effects are complete mysteries to the doctors who prescribe them was all part of that Merciful God routine, too?

Your God doesn't exist -- there is no all-powerful, merciful, loving being. If there were this world would be quite a different place (spare me the Free Will routine!). If God exists, She is a capricious, vengeful, spiteful, disinterested, petty little beast. I could find far more proof for the existence of that sort of God than you can for the one you believe in. Either you're terribly mistaken about who and what God is or isn't, or you choose to ignore the evidence before your eyes.

I'll tone down the assault on your so-called faith when you finally have the courage to admit that faith doesn't necessarily save -- it far too often destroys.Update: If there are readers out there who may be suffering from any of the disorders I've talked about here, and you need someone to help, or just listen to you, or maybe give you a little bit of hope and advice...I'm here for you. We're all-too-often dismissed as dangerous, or treated like lepers, and so if we don't help each other out, we're probably doomed, right? You can contact me at Excelsior502@gmail.com.

I can't help thinking that if they had been would-be suicide bombers, things would have been different for them.

Maybe the administration would have be en taking great pains to ensure that the rights of these two men weren't so grossly violated, and that justice would be served without the interference of politics.

But, nooooo...These two men aren't terrorists; merely the men who help to fight them. In Liberal circles, this makes them even worse than terrorists themselves.

This administration is seriously weakening this country's defenses in the face of Islamofascists in ways that we cannot even begin to imagine. It is currently engineering our ultimate surrender, even as it does things like use Predator drones and send Marines into the Brutal Afghan Winter. Because the Obamatards, and many on the Left, have failed to discern the central tenet in this war; the other side wants us d-e-a-d, or failing that, helpless, defeated mentally and spiritually so that it doesn't have to defeat us militarily. Trying to prosecute CIA and Justice Department officials who are engaged in the War on Terror is just as good to Al'Qaeda as if they managed to drop another skyscraper. Treating terrorism as a legal problem 'normalizes' it; it signals a willingness to accept a certain level of Islamic ass-rape as a means of avoiding even greater violence. Treating Terrorists as shoplifters and jaywalkers, rather than as War Criminals is a signal of weakness and acceptance. Attempts to change the focus of our defense against terrorists from military and intelligence means (which have been largely successful, although they haven't gone far enough for my tastes), to legal and diplomatic ones, is to admit that you have no stomach for a fight.

You might as well bend over and hang a sign over your rump that says "Insert Big, Purple Shaft Here."

In the meantime, turbin-wearin', camel-bangin', bomb-buidin' idiots squat in mud huts trying to figure out how to sneak explosives onto an airliner, and a bunch of Theocratic nutjobs in Tehran try to figure out how to build and deliver the Big Boom-Boom. In both cases, the wingnuts are not concerned with notions of justice or diplomacy -- their notions of these concepts do not match ours in any case; they want to kill Westerners, specifically Americans and Jews, in large enough numbers as to frighten us into leaving them alone.Granted the freedom that an America in retreat or isolation provides them, they can continue to spread the poison of an Islamic Caliphate that stretches from Persia to Andalusia, and if they have to behead every Christian and Jew they find along the way, so much the better.

They blow up airliners, shoot up pizzerias, lob rockets into your back garden so that they may instigate tyranny, bit-by-bit. It is a pious tyranny that will be far worse than anything ever unleashed by Stalin or Hitler. And the truly clever part, is that while the Islamofascists push their own tyranny, they bait their enemies into implementing their own -- because the response to every terrorist attack or threat has not been to go after terrorists, but to implement policies which ultimately limit the freedoms of everyone else. A Caliphate where society is ordered upon the religious dictates of a Dead Pedophile is really not all that different from one in which society is ordered by the dictates of a Brain-Dead Mega-Bureaucracy that expends it's energy in forcing conformity of thought and action, and which diminishes freedom -- only without the praying. It is the logical consequence of a Federal Government which refuses to prosecute War Criminals as zealously as it does those who actually would. The only real difference between Muslo-rats and Democrats is that Muslo-rats at least have the decency to be honest about their common goals.

Maybe that is the real issue; the existence of a terrorist threat is not seen as a danger to Liberals, because it gives them an excuse (National Security) do that which their ideology already demands (Government control of people's lives). And they said George W. Bush and John Ashcroft armed with a Patriot Act were evil? Liberal softness on terrorists and tenacity against the anti-terrorists is easily explained by this theory. It's better than the alternate theory: that Obama is simply nuts and/or stupid.

Friday, February 19, 2010

And, damn if I wasn't right in all of my predictions! Except for the Buddhism thing...I thought Tiger would go the Allah route and have some of those Farrakhan-looking guys around him. Because, you know, that's what Mike Tyson and Tawana Brawley did when they found religion. Anyway, the article makes no reference to it at all, in any case, because the mainstream media even mentioning religion, even a hippie one like Buddhism, causes reporters' heads to explode.

Anyways, Tiger's going back into rehab, to hide, certainly, but to heal? To change? To make himself a better man, husband and father? I wouldn't count on it, and I personally could give a rat's behind. I have my own life, and don't need to to live vicariously through Tiger Woods, thank you.

Randy men, you see, tend to stay that way, until slowed by age and gray hair and the bad back -- and then they eat Viagra like candy, trying to keep the side up for at least one more week. Eventually, they've been worn out, or they get clapped-out, and those are the only ways the rutting season ever comes to a true end. This Tiger is not going to change his stripes anytime soon, I don't think, but I guess the sporting thing to do is to wish him luck and hope that he does, huh?

So....good luck. I really, really, really hope you can finally learn how to keep your zipper closed, like a civilized human being, and you gain a measure of control over your schlong, because you know, you're NOT a baboon. I hope you can manage that easily and long enough to return to that stupid little thing you do with a stick and a tiny ball, that has no body-checking, tackling, or defense of any kind, but which fat, rich white men with no personalities and a lot of tummy blubber still insist is a sport. I guess because if it weren't considered a sport, something for real men, then it would be...I don't know...super-gay. I don't know, something about chasing balls around a manicured lawn in business casual just screams "GAY!", but that's me.

Anyway, about that zipper thing; I can see where you just might need to go to school to learn that you shouldn't leave your seed in every willing orifice you might come (no pun intended) across. I mean, I thought all the higher primates could, to one extent or another, control that sort of thing. Chimpanzees on speed apparently fucked less that Tiger -- who judging from the rogues' gallery of Waffle House and Wal-Mart conquests -- merely required the faintest heartbeat and a body at room temperature.

I mean, it's a disease, right? Being unable to stop fucking everything that moves? It's some sort of disability, the inability to keep a zipper in the upright position and closed. Such a difficult task that one apparently has to get professional help to better explain the concept. I don't buy it for a moment; I think Tiger's just taking an extended vacation in what purports to be a rehab facility, and intends to stay there for as long as it takes the worst of the furor over his...indiscretions...to finally die away, and then he can return to the golf course, and be the same old dispassionate, control-freak, cold-blooded motherfucker he was before this all happened. He's simply hiding until this great embarrassment is forgotten.

The only things he's probably learned from the experience, I reckon, is that the next time he'll make certain the bitch doesn't have text messaging, and signs a non-disclosure agreement before foreplay.

You can fool yourself and hide in your fake-rehab, all you want, Tiger. You're not really there to fix anything as much as you are to avoid the public humiliation; we'll still be laughing at you in another year, rest assured. Why, I bet the second you leave that rehab facility, you'll make an "innocent suggestion" to the boys that "Damn, I could really go for some Denny's right about now..." because I guess to you, a Grand Slam isn't just for breakfast anymore. You can't help yourself, and despite all the high-priced professional help in the world, you never will.

Thursday, February 18, 2010

By now, unless you've been living in a cave in Ethiopia, you have heard the news about someone allegedly, with deliberation, crashing a small airplane into what looks like an IRS office in Austin, Texas.

Joseph Andrew Stack, alleged to have been the pilot at this point in time, also appears to have burned his own house down and left a suicide note; a long manifesto, as it's being called, about what his pet peeves were before he took such drastic action. Speculation is that his beef was with the IRS, but the 'manifesto' makes it clear that he thought he had a lot more to gripe about.

As someone who has had experience with both suicide pilots (having been directly under the first plane to hit One World Trade Center on September, 11), and mental health issues, his ranting on the Fed'ral Gubmint, and his choice to use an aircraft to get it's attention, is telling.

I have never been more frightened of anything in my life than the sight of an airliner heading in my direction. I think I would rather be slathered in gravy and dropped into a shark tank than to ever be in that position again. That's a feeling of utter helplessness on a scale that is just too enormous for words to convey. It's the very fear that something that big and that powerful is headed your way, and that you can't stop it. You are about to become a spectator in your own demise, unless something miraculous happens. In my case, there were several buildings and a bit of distance between myself and the impact, and that's why I'm here to talk about it.

But it is exactly that fear that I think Mr. Stack was was trying to instill in those who would witness (or suffer the consequences of) his suicide. Fear is a weapon more powerful than any gun or any bomb. That was Joseph Stack's weapon of choice against those who were tormenting him. I say "those who were", even if that hasn't been definitively proven at this point, because of his other bizarre action; he burned his house down. That's the sign of a man who's going to make certain that if the IRS is out to get him, that he's going to make certain it doesn't get it's pound of flesh. If we are to believe that Mr. Stack had troubles with the taxman, then his actions begin to make sense -- they start to become almost-rational actions; he was going to deny the government the ability to collect by destroying his biggest assets -- his home and his plane, and take a few Reve-nooers with him.

That Mr. Stack chose to attack a building with the IRS in it is also telling. He had obviously come to the conclusion that the government doesn't do anything unless the government itself, rather than it's individual citizens, is under attack. His suicide screed is full of references to a dysfunctional government stuffed to the rafters with greedy, self-interested little tools who only seem to care about anything when it's their own rice bowl on the block.

Taken in this light, what Joseph Andrew Stack allegedly has done, makes perfect sense (although it can't be condoned). He has a beef with the government, he feels they don't care about his rights or his welfare, and so he attacks the source of his torment, and does it in a way that is designed to instill fear in Them (the government) while denying Them what "they" wants most: his money.

In time, we'll find out more about Mr. Stack and his ultimate motivations, but in the meantime, the aftermath is somewhat easier to predict.

You know what'll happen now, when questions begin to get answered, and new ones begin to get asked, don't you? There will be hundreds of hours of ridiculous Senate Hearings which are nothing but long-winded attempts by individuals inside competing and often-contradictory bureaucracies to point fingers at each other, and give Congresscritters an opportunity to get their ugly mugs on television, and more excuses to engage in graft when the 'overhauled' system they re-re-re-design has to be even more lavishly-funded -- to be even less effective than the one's currently in place. And the rights of we citizens get squeezed just a little bit more.

This is the government response to every problem, after all. The difference this time around is that the people are aware of how the game gets played. They'll actually watch the Senate Hearings, they'll actually read the whitewashed reports, they'll actually be asking Congressman So-and-so "What will yo DO about this sort of thing?" and finally put the asshole on the spot, revealing him to be an even bigger douchebag that he appeared to be at first blush.

Joseph Andrew Stack has become Osama bin Laden; using fear and aircraft in such a way as to cause the American people to question their government, and as a result, having the government expose it's silliness, ineffectiveness, sloth, and stupidity. Each call for government to "do something" will result in a further loss of liberty, higher taxes, and a general deterioration of the American quality of life.

And then there will be another Joseph Andrew Stack, only with a cement truck, a taxi cab, a city bus, a train, a bulldozer. A Domino Theory if ever there was one, and as each falls, more discontent with government makes itself known, and the more the government wraps itself up in red tape. Reaching a critical mass, perhaps there's even revolution.

Because each attack, whether it's a guy with explosive boxer shorts or a fed-up taxpayer with a Cessna, has the same effect; life in America becomes increasingly harder with every government response. I don't mean to imply that Mr. Stack is a revolutionary, on par with Thomas Paine or Nathan Hale, or that he might have even seen himself that way, only that there are some who could make that argument -- and make it convincingly. J.A. Stack would strike the first blow and others would follow until Leviathan was pinned to the ground, and it's carcase picked clean by the ants. Who knows?

Now, as to mental illness. Mr. Stack was obviously mentally ill. Sane people don't wake up one day and decide that setting out to commit mass-murder is a solution to their problems. He takes a whack at the insurance companies in his 'manifesto' that echo many of the same thoughts I've had myself. There's a hint in there that the man KNEW he was mentally ill, but he may have been treated shabbily by his insurance company. This is not unknown; I have been treated this way, as well. To an insurance company, a mental illness is not really an illness, not like breast cancer or heart disease. Mental illnesses are not handled in the same way as those are, typically because they believe that mental illnesses are not 'catastrophic' and can be expected to just "go away" with cheaper and less-effective "treatment".

I can tell you that it doesn't work that way. You get breast cancer, you can fix it with surgery, chemotherapy and radiation. If you have diabetes, you can control it with medication, diet and exercise. Mental illnesses involve the most important organ, and the one that science knows the very least about; the human brain. Despite what "Mental Health Experts" say, they really know very little about how the human brain and mind work, and often the more traditional methods of dealing with mental patients --drugs and talk -- don't work. As far as most insurance companies go, those treatments are supposed to work, and according to a predictable timetable, as well. If your mental problems aren't solved within the timetable, then you're screwed, and then you find yourself buried even deeper in mental anguish -- only now you have deal with the other issues that no one talks about; being addicted to the drugs you were prescribed and the changes to your brain and physical chemistry they provoked.

Some people will disagree with me, especially the "mental health and insurance professionals", but I'm here to tell you that you're all full of shit. You regard the mentally ill in the same way you regard an enema; something slightly disgusting and best gotten rid of as soon as possible. Illegal Aliens and Crack Whores get more consideration and real help in this country than the Mentally Ill.

So, to speculate (because I have very little in the way of hard-and-fast facts on my side); you have a obviously mentally-ill man, perhaps one who has been driven there by the IRS and their often-overzealous and relentless methods. He might not be in treatment because his insurance company decided he didn't heal on a schedule devised by people with very little actual knowledge. Now devoid of psychiatric care, feeling as if his calls for help and understanding -- to be given a break because he needs one -- fall upon deaf ears, increasingly-frustrated, in agony, misunderstood, avoided by many, he does the unthinkable and attempts a murder-suicide by aircraft, hoping to draw attention to his plight.

Why else do you think people do this sort of thing? In his (assumed) state-of-mind, it's the only way he could get anyone to take him seriously. I know: I've been there and thought about doing something similar myself! The difference is that I know it will ultimately solve nothing, and besides, I've never owned anything bigger than a sub-compact. Mr. Stack might not have been able to come to the same conclusion.

The child has not been found, alive or dead, at this time, but I think barring some miracle, we can probably consider this child as lost. Murdered by a lunatic who happened to be her sperm donor. I call him "sperm donor" because the word "father" cannot be applied to a probably-raving madman who is capable of doing this sort of despicable thing.

Take note of the sperm donor's name; I'm betting that the word "Islam" will enter into this story at some point.

This monster's father was on the local evening news, and was the stereotype of the "Americanized" Muslim; apparently emotionless, vacant-eyed, fatalistic and unable to take the goddamned Bluetooth earpiece out to talk to the newspeople he brought into his own home to interview him. Apparently fucking oblivious, or perhaps not even caring, that something terrible and evil had occurred -- and that his offspring did the deed.

I want to see this motherfucker bound-and-chained, sewn into a sack with a rabid, wild boar and tossed into the icy river himself.

Expect to hear the words: "I have found God" or even "I have found Allah" somewhere in that monologue (since Tiger will be taking no questions, at all, from the very few and very-carefully-selected members of the Press, it's a televised monologue).

These things follow a set script: admit the transgression, take responsibility whether you mean it or not, go to some form of "rehab", and re-emerge as a "changed man", waving the Scriptural Document of Your Choice, and tell the public you will no longer talk about the past.Until you DO have to talk about it. That usually happens when your wife calls your bluff and takes you to divorce court, or your ego gets the best of you and Playboy or something wants that juicy, in-depth interview, or the National Enquirer digs up even better, and juicier dirt, and you have to go on Oprah.

Tiger, you should have stayed in the bunker for a while longer, my friend. These press conferences with the press and very little conference will not rebuild the reputation and goodwill you once had.

And that's nothing; in my days on Wall Street, the stupidity of management was always on display. In fact, they would call you into great, big meetings to proudly announce their stupidity publicly, on a regular basis. Complete with leather-stadium seating in the air-conditioned 300-seat amphitheatre, to introduce a parade of people you've never heard of to explain what's on the expensively-produced and vividly colorful overhead slides -- and once even, a really kick-ass light and music show -- complete with expensive gadgets and huge binders full of expensively-printed materials -- usually to announce that Management has stopped serving fresh fruit in the Executive Dining Room as a cost-cutting measure, or has come up with a new-and-improved Parking Spot Distribution Plan.When I worked for Smith-Barney, they once spent $3 million dollars to install a big, red, solid-steel umbrella outside the office (Smith-Barney was then a member of Traveler's Group) embedded in concrete, right on the sidewalk. That same week, practically, they announced that executives would be expected to share limo rides in order to reduce overhead.

This guy got even less of a vetting than most Obama Administration nominees. When I apply for a job on Wall Street, they usually check my background very thoroughly -- even my credit score -- to evaluate my potential 'risk' as an employee. This process, which includes fingerprinting, photographing, and in some cases, a request to see your medical records or even a polygraph test, can kill many applicants before they barely finish the complimentary cup of coffee before the first interview. This phony not only got a tony job, he got it with false documents and barely a phone call to his former employer to ensure he was who and what he said he was (that former employer no doubt talked his virtues up -- probably because he knew this guy was as thief and was happy to be rid of him). Expect the clients of of his former employer to begin asking serious questions about whether or not their portfolio crossed paths with this douche.

You can just see the vultures...errr...lawyers circling now.

This guy walked in, and on a handshake, got a $700k loan on favorable terms?

These are supposed to be the Best and the Brightest. The Harvard, Wharton and Stanford MBA's. The Economic Experts. The Big Guns. The very cream of the crop. Your money couldn't be in better hands, right? Now you know how 'bubbles' are created and quickly burst; these guys have no common sense whatsoever, and they routinely bend or ignore the very rules they put in place to protect the shareholder (really, to protect the Firm) to torture the salaried cubicle slaves with. But not their Own Kind. Or people they think are their Own Kind. Don't worry about the idiot who gave him the money: he'll no doubt be fired, but probably land at Citibank or JPMorgan in a few weeks...with a higher salary and zippier title.That how it works. The path to success on Wall Street is to be a fuck-up. Fuck-ups get promoted to where they can do less harm.

I would not be treated this way, for despite my former importance to the company (my work not only enabled Smith-Barney to trade securities at high speed, cheaply, and in fantastical quantity, but with the added benefit of being able to fire thousands of back-office untermenschen, to boot). My sort of work was merely considered a necessary expense, and so, I could never expect a million bucks a year, especially since I had no college education. But, it's an amazing thing that a Wall Street firm will relentlessly investigate and pry into the life of a 100k-a-year System's Programmer like me, to make sure I don't smoke pot, kick my dog, have a sterling reputation, and even then they'll record my phone calls and monitor my Internet activity, like I was some sort of criminal, and still expect me to work 70 hours a week...with a smile. But a guy who turns out to be a REAL Criminal, armed with a stack of phony documents and a talent for bullshit can be given a massive loan on very favorable terms. On his very first day?

Even if this guy wasn't a scammer, all he really is is a Federally-licenced bookie. The only difference between him and Tony the Nose at the corner Bar-and-Grill is that this guy would have handicapped stocks, bonds and commodities instead of football teams and racehorses. Tony breaks your kneecaps when you don't pay up, these guys just bleed you to death with a thousand papercuts. But I digress...

This is why Merrill Lynch, amongst others, should have been allowed to fail; people who treat other people's money (and it is Other People's Money, after all) so casually-- allegedly -- shouldn't be allowed to stay in business.

Note: I know this feature usually appears on Mondays, but I was quite busy earlier in the week and forgot all about it. I'm back on schedule now...I think.

The recent battle royale on the Sunday talk shows revolved around the war of words between Vice Presidents: Dick Cheney and Joe Biden, on the subject of the War on Terror (more like the Public-Relations-Campaign-With-Guns-Against-Terror, but that's another post entirely).Dick has made himself a thorn in the side of the Obambi Administration (such as it is) by continually, and factually, accusing the Obamatards of being weak in the face of Islamofascist terrorism. Never ones to let anything that can even be remotely construed as a Personal Attack upon His Heinous Barack I to go unchallenged, the Obameisters sent Joe Biden out to 'set the record straight'.

Joe Biden is perhaps one of the biggest political doofuses in American history, perhaps even outpacing anyone with the surname 'Kennedy'. A man so bland and uninteresting that he has had to invent an entirely new past for himself, and not just once, but several times. The makeovers and repackaging occur at dizzying speeds, as Joe tries to stay one step ahead of those who know he's an asshole, but just haven't convinced enough people to pay attention yet.

The best-known version of Joe Biden's past belonged to another, and arguably better, man: Neil Kinnock, the Welsh-born leader of Britain's'Old Labour' party who railed against what he thought of as the Nazi-like Margaret Thatcher and her Conservatives in the British Parliament. Kinnock, born into a hardscrabble existence to a common laborer and a nurse, was one of those old-time success stories; the local lad made good through hard work, sharpened by the rough-and-tumble of life and politics, until he stood as a Statesman of the First Degree and a Man of the People. Kinnock at least had the advantage of being believable and articulate, even if you hated his guts.

Of course, Joe had to eventually admit to 'borrowing' parts of Kinnock's life (including his speeches) to burnish his own reputation, and it cost him his first run for the Presidency. Perhaps if Joe had taken notice of the fact that Kinnock was often referred to as "The Welsh Windbag" he might have selected a different life story to co-opt. But Joe never knows when to stop; it's a habit. He also had to admit to another act of plagiarism, as when he lifted an entire law review article and passed it on as his own work during his first year of Law School. He went through several other permutations: Joe the Amtrak Commuter, Joe the Regular Guy having coffee with he hoi-polloi in a diner that had been closed for a decade, Joe the Loveable Dope who couldn't help but trip over his own tongue.

But this new-and-improved Joe Biden, the Terror Warrior Extraordinaire, the perfect foil to the Evil Darth Cheney, is just too much to bear with a straight face. It's almost hard to take him seriously and this presents one with an interesting conundrum; you know he's a pompous ass, a screaming moron, a 'Me-Too!' sort of guy, but compared to his Boss, he's almost credible despite the literally-storybook past and propensity to talk out both sides of his mouth and rectum simultaneously.

The subject this past Sunday was whether the Obama Administration sends the wrong message about it's supposedly-tough stance on Terrorism when it tries to convict terrorists in civilian courts, rather than in Military Tribunals. The answer to this is a resounding "YES!" to anyone with more sense than a cocker spaniel, but Joe is compelled to spin yet one more fantasy yarn; Barack Obama is prosecuting terrorists in the same way that George W. Bush did. So, there's no need for Dick Cheney to open his yap, is there?

Essentially, this argument is true; the difference, however, between the Bush Administration's handling of terror trials and Barack Obama's lies in the context.

Bush ordered these cases be tried by Military Courts, only to run afoul of the democratic Congress and the Far-Left who wants to see America humbled yet again. It was they who screamed about such things being blatantly "unfair' and challenging Bush's authority as Commander-in-Chief to do such things. The Supreme Court of the United States agreed; the President may be Commander in Chief, but he did not have the authority to try these scum in military courts without the authorization of Congress. Authorization was sought, and received. Twice. Both laws granting Bush that authority passed Constitutional Muster (although not without dissent from the knuckleheads on the Left side of the Supreme Court), and every time the Bush Administration tried to convict a terrorist in Military Courts, the attempt was pre-emptively stymied by counter-suits filed by every left-leaning, terrorist-coddling organization you could think of. Some of them even associated with Eric Holder.

Bush eventually had no choice, despite having the authority to try these scumbags in Military Courts, but to try terrorists in Civilian courts -- if they were to be tried and convicted at all, and the trials themselves not held hostage to years of litigation in defense of killers.

Barack Obama, then a Senator, incidentally voted against both authorizations for military tribunals, telling you where his heart truly lay. If that isn't enough, guess who his Attorney General is? To be fair, you can give Obama his due in this regard: while he's a lying sack of crap about using all the tools available to him in the fight against terrorism, and he's wrong about using Civilian Courts to try what are, essentially, War Crimes, he's at least consistent in which tools he chooses to use, and his general attitude towards treating Terrorism as a criminal and diplomatic matter, easily handled with lawyers and envoys. Military Tribunals are opposed by the Left -- because the trials might be found to be fair after all, and even more expeditious than civilian trials, and this would burst their myth of America as a racist, despicable place that burns witches and gays at the stake and shoots puppies between the eyes on behalf of ExxonMobil or Jerry Falwell. No Leftist can admit that the Military can be fair or trustworthy (it's an evil institution that kills people of color for money), and the United States should never be allowed to win anything. Not wars... and certainly not trials.

For not making this fine, but important, distinction clear,for not telling the absolute truth to the public, and for not telling the whole story of the trials and tribulations the Military Tribunal system has been through, and for having the audacity to dare to compare his douchebag boss to George W.Bush, Joe Biden has achieved a level of douchery rarely seen and hardly to be believed.

I recall from my history studies that in the Second Wold War, an American General sent to aid the sorry excuse of a government of Chaiang Kai-shek in it's fight against the Japanese, General Stilwell -- one f the forgotten heroes of that era -- who was referred to as "Vinegar Joe" because of his abrasive and combative attitude. Stillwell was hard to get along with, yes, but he was a brilliant, fighting general who was dropped into a politically-impossible situation, and was frustrated in his attempts to defeat the enemy. I think I refer to Biden as "Vinegar and Water Joe" because of his manifest douchiness, but also because of this semi-parallel: Biden's brand of poltically-generated pablum makes it difficult for today's generals to defeat their enemies, too.

I wish Dick Cheney would challenge Joe Biden to a fistfight and kick his ass.

The mind reels at the state of the American Republic today. What was once a free, productive and positive country has now become a polarized, antagonistic, angry, depressed nation on it's way to government-enforced regimentation and servitude. The mantras of 2008 were "Yes We Can", the "Audacity of Hope!" and "Change You Can Believe In", which now ring hollow in ears that are daily boxed by the Commander in Grief, the new-and-improved, and much better-dressed, version of Big Brother who monopolizes our televisions with his virtuoso Tap Dance of Flaming Bullshit. Those once-inspiring mantras, once carefully-selected to appeal to the greater mass of desperate retards in the Recipient Classes, have been replaced by the newer, tinnier refrains of "It's Bush's Fault", "Change Doesn't Happen Overnight", and "Two Million Jobs Saved or Created", and the opening steps of President Obama's new dance; the Waltz Into Historical Failure.

The way things are going, he'll be lucky if he can manage to move his limbs at all, soon.

The oft-repeated lies "No tax increases for those making under $250,000 a year", "Not One Dime", "I will Close Guantanamo", "It'll be on C-Span", "Keep unemployment under 9%", are repeated several hundred times a day by democratic (small 'd' intentional) operatives and members of Congress who's personal rice bowls -- and what's left of their reputations -- are tied up in the fantasy that Barack Obama is a leader. "Leader" is not a word I would use to describe a man who you know doesn't even walk his own carefully-selected-for-the-photo-op dog.

The Truth of Barack Obama is this: we asked for it (not me personally, because I didn't vote for the guy). The man had a resume hat was thinner than that of your local Taco Bell night shift supervisor -- that should have been the first clue. Voting "Present" a bazillion times was an indication of either abject spinelessness, an incredible cluelessness, or someone who really didn't have an opinion or a conviction worth stating or defending. More likely, it was the hallmark of a calculating politician. The attachment to obviously politically-expedient or useful morons who called America a 'racist nation', or who assume that all White people wear sheets and burn crosses, or who planted bombs and called it legitimate political discourse, was another red flag.

The Truth of what his "Hope and Change" has brought us is this: we're deeper in debt than ever. The Federal Government is spending money faster than it can print it. The World's premier economy is collapsing for want of proven, common sense solutions under the weight of government spending, bailouts, cash giveaways to politically-connected unions and politically-favored classes, while the man berates the productive for their "selfishness" as he plans to rob them blind.

The country is embroiled in two wars, and while this is not Barack Obama's fault (one of the few things that isn't his responsibility), he's obviously decided to fight both half-heartedly. While you can give him credit for committing more troops to the Afghan campaign, he only did so after dithering over the question for months -- just long enough for people to mostly forget that he opposed a similar surge strategy in Iraq (which has worked, incidentally). While he orders Predator drone strikes (because God forbid we offend the Pakistanis who created the Taliban and protect the worst of the lot, and actually go after terrorists wherever we find them), he sends out an "Envoy to the Muslim World" and sends taped holiday greetings to the Religion of Death, even speaking Arabic and Farsi just so he can polish his ultimately-worthless multi-culti-citizen-of-the-world rep.

Democrats think that kind of thing is cool. Then again, Democrats still think JFK was a good President and that Bill Clinton was hounded by a Vast Right-Wing Conspiracy and not the victim of his own foolishness and narcissism.

In the meantime, the Islamonazis plant explosives in the their underwear, open new fronts from which to fight, build nuclear weapons and are granted constitutional rights and free lawyers. Israel is dissuaded from acting in it's own self-interest because the ridiculous idea that diplomacy will solve the majority of the terrorist problem must be pursued before our Commander of Sheep sees his popularity polls dip... in Germany. Right now, Marines are fighting in Afghanistan in the dead of winter to wipe the Taliban and Al'Qaeda scum out, and our President appoints a terrorist sympathizer to talk to the Muslim world even more. "Jaw-Jaw is better than War-War", said Winston Churchill, but even Churchill recognized that one must fight, and fight to win, when confronted with enemies with whom there can be no accommodation.

Still, the Most Eloquent Man to Ever Read a Speech Written By Someone Else and Fed Into a Teleprompter beats his own drum relentlessly. He takes credit for accomplishments that arent even his own , like the success of the surge in Iraq. You remember; the one that he voted against and criticized. He invents numbers like "2,000,000 jobs saved" knowing that it can never be disproven under an accounting scheme that would have gotten someone at Morgan Stanley or Citibank a jail sentence. He never takes credit for failure...no, no, no...That's George Bush's or 'The Republicans" fault. Even the ones that can be laid directly at his feet. He never listens to the criticism of his opponents with anything other than a readiness to take personal offense, even when they're not calling him a "Socialist" or worse. He believes he knows all, and does not need to listen, and when he does feign to do so, it's merely polticial posturing or in response to a negative poll number. All that's needed for Obama's Fatherland with Smiley Faces to succeed is for the American Sheeple to simply comply, quietly. Just Surrender to His Magnificence and all things will fall into place.

Those ideas worked so well in Russia and China that both abandoned Socialist for two-fisted Capitalism, red in tooth and claw.

The Man Who Claimed He Was President for All Americans seems more concerned with those who aren't Americans; Illegal Aliens must be given medical care at someone else's expense. And Amnesty so that they can vote. Policies that are little more than handing out cash on street corners are targeted at those who are loyal supporters or members of "oppressed" minority groups, whether it is Cash-for-Clunkers, Mortgage Renegotiation Schemes, Unions exempted from taxes the rest of us have to pay, or buying votes in broad daylight; The Bribery on the Bayeux, The Cornhusker Kickback.

But this should have been expected. The man comes from a political tradition convinced that taxes are too low, but ATM fees are too high, and still calls itself intelligent and principled. That tradition believes that guns, inanimate objects incapable of independent action, kill people. The same tradition that holds that all of America's Ills can be cured with the same formula; Soak the Rich, Screw The Middle Class, Create a Permanent-Legally-Protected Underclass, play the Class Warfare and Race cards as often as possible, and apply the concept of personal choice" so narrowly that it should only apply to the killing of unborn (or nearly-born) infants, but never to people deciding what is in their OWN bestinterests. These things are best handled by nameless, faceless, lavishly-funded and politically-engineered bureaucracies. It follows, naturally, the power of what choices should be available and which will be forced upon you (by suppository, if necessary) rests not with We The People, but instead with We The Self-Elected-and-Panty-Bunched Hall Monitors of American Society. It is a movement of the Ill-informed but Well-intentioned led by the Well-Informed but Ill-Intentioned, easily swayed and directed by specious strawman arguments that are more about the manipulation of base emotions than they are about logic and common sense.

And so, here we are; We have no money. We have no jobs. The Hope fades, the Change that was pictured on the box is not indicative of the Change we found inside it. It's like buying a box of Cracker-Jacks and getting a turd in the prize envelope. You asked for it, America, you got it; you followed a man with Third-World policies matched by a Third-World mentality. You thought he was smart; after all, the man was a Constitutional Scholar and Editor of the Harvard Law review. Why, he's such a brilliant lawyer that he's managed to criticize the Supreme Court, publicly, for a decision he didn't like, but apparently couldn't be bothered to read, but what difference does that make? It's not as if he actually believes in the Constitution (apparently, it only applies to terrorists caught red-fucking-handed, and is important only when one wants to hold show trials for other terrorists). He's so smart that he wrote two books; and by that I mean he merely signed his name to them...the rest was written by other people. Just like those eloquent, powerful speeches that get Chris Matthew's leg all tingly. If Barack Obama the Candidate had been seen on C-Span instead of (P)MSNBC, perhaps those who voted for this douche would have figured it all out.

Oh, right; C-Span is simply a rhetorical device. I forgot.

But still, give the man his due. Even if the Audacity of Hope has morphed into the Audacity of Dope, he still managed to pull off one of the Greatest Scams in American History; he convinced 52% of the votes that 'Community Organizer" was a real profession. He's managed to make Hillary Clinton appear to have been the saner and more-attractive option. He's succeeded in making Barney Fwank appear more manly. The Obama Aura seems poised to knock off more democratic Congresscritters than Newt Gingrich and Bags of Cash in the Freezer...combined. The President has accomplished the incredible feat of making Joe Biden, until recently a joke and merely annoying back-bencher, appear both relevant and Statesmanlike. Michael Steele. John Boehner and Mitch McConnel look like Real Leaders by comparison. He's made Glenn Beck filthy rich, and Rush Limbaugh filthier-richer still. Barack Obama makes Jimmy Carter look like a sane man. He's made a tax evader the head of the IRS. He's spawned a nostalgia for George W. Bush.

He's won a Nobel Prize for being black.

How do you possibly top that? What can you possibly do for an encore?

At this point in time, Barack Obama could lead Osama bin Laden into Times Square in chains, and a sizable percentage of the audience might seriously consider stoning Obama to death first. He could Piss Beer and Shit Skittles and you still wouldn't want him anywhere near your Super Bowl party.

Barack Obama was always a Creation; of the media, of the irrational guilt that some liberalsthe still bear for the stain of slavery, of the Political Correctness of the Democratic Party Machine, of the desperate times in which he was elected. He promised to be a Savior, but has instead become a Stinker. He will go down in history as one of the worst Presidents this country has ever endured. It is now apparent that this man was never prepared to be President, never mind the exigent circumstances of his election. He's never worked in the public sector, he's never served in the military, he'd never really left the sheltered world of the Ivy League Ivory Tower and never drew a paycheck that wasn't swiped from someone else's pocket.

Thankfully, in a short time, if we can just hang on, some real Hope may be restored. Not by Stimulus Bills that stimulate nothing except ACORN and the SEIU, not by adopting Nazi-party economics and making the largest corporations de facto arms of the Federal Government. No, this hope comes in the form of a lovely little 8-letter word: N-O-V-E-M-B-E-R. The People are pissed; they will stand for no more. They have remembered that they were promised a government "Of the People, By the People and For the People", and not a government "Of the Unions, By The Liberal Elite, and For the Lazy, Halt and Stupid".

With luck, the damage done to us in Our Winter of Discontent may be contained, and the process can begin to reverse it. In time we may recover.

Why are we still trying to talk these people into liking us? What makes some dickhead politician believe that an enemy who states his primary goals as the destruction of your culture and the enslavement of your population will be won over by charm and polite dialogue? What makes the same politician think that getting someone with his own alleged ties to terrorist-supporting scum is some sort of coup?

Doesn't anyone in the White House read the papers (oh, right; they're too busy telling the papers what to print,and how to print it)? THERE'S A WAR ON. A War started by Muslims who don't play by the same set of rules that more civilized societies do. Do you expect that by simply naming an envoy that you somehow send some sort of secret signal to the more extreme elements of Islamic society that you're serious about defending yourself from their lunatics, or is it symbolically a White Flag?

I'm sure the Saudi and Pakistani governments (which are propped up and defended by American aid and military power) will applaud such a move, calling it a major step on the way to peace and understanding, but it does absolutely nothing to solve the problem; there are mentally-constipated douchebags squatting in mud huts, right this very second, trying to figure out clever and sneaky ways to kill as many Americans as possible. Do you think that because Obambi names an "Envoy" that the hearts and minds of such men will be won over? Do you think that naming an "Envoy" will cause the Saudis and Pakistanis to do the right thing and kill these slugs before they strike? Do you think that naming an "Envoy" will cause those (few) Muslims who don't want us all dead or enslaved do the right thing and turn their insane brethren into the authorities before they embark on terrorist attacks?

I've said it before, and I will reiterate: the only way there will be "Peace" is when those elements of what passes for Islamic Culture, the ones that incubate and succor the kind of stupidity that breeds suicide bombers and snipers is made to see the error of their ways. That can only be done by inflicting massive casualties and unspeakable suffering upon the populations that raise, indoctrinate, support and hide these scumbags.

When the Islamic World that gave birth to these degenerates is reduced to picking the undigested thistles out of camel dung for sustenance, drinking out of mud puddles, and otherwise too busy trying to avoid cholera and bubonic plague will they begin to see that, perhaps, antagonizing and attacking a country and a culture which can destroy their own and ensure that it never recovers for centuries, if ever, is a very bad idea. When the Majority of Muslims are made to suffer horribly for the sins of the Few, the Majority will do it's level-best to keep the Few from building explosive jock straps, blowing up public transport, shooting up shopping malls and hijacking airliners.

Stop with the crazy and impractical ideas about diplomacy being the way to Peace; it only lends credence to the idea that the "Muslim World" does, indeed, have legitimate goals that can be negotiated for. To these people, "diplomacy" only means an opportunity to change the terms of the argument and a "time out" in which to rearm and then renew hostilities.

P.S. whichever asshole-career-civil-servant-or-political-operative did such a wonderful job of vetting this guy for the job should be taken out and shot; if you simply MUST have an Envoy to the Followers of an Insane Pedophile (Peace be Upon Him), you could at least choose one who is not associated with convicted terrorists.Update:Here's an example of just who you're sending an Envoy to.(Hat-tip to FiveFeetofFury).

My issue is not with Christianity, it's with Christian Mythology and with a certain Calvinist strain which, in contradictory fashion, insists that while God has granted me the Gifts of Life, Natural Rights and Free Will -- and even recognizes me as an unique individual deserving of his Love and Grace -- then, arbitrarily, decides that because I do not use those gifts in a way they consider to be "in true service and obedience to God" (that is, that I might behave in ways they do not personally approve of) that I'm somehow scum, and fall outside the Grace of God.

Christ, the bringer of Unconditional Love, came to "save" us, God's Children all; except for those who don't kiss his ass? And certainly not those who don't kiss his ass, beg for forgiveness, grovel before him and shower shitloads of money upon his 'chosen' agents on Earth in a manner some others (themselves fallible men!) insist is the only appropriate way?

That brand of Christianity is not Christianity at all. Christ recognized the inherent worth and dignity of all people, and it's why he hung out with the beggars, lepers, prostitutes and mental patients, in other words, the people the rest of polite society considered Scum. There is not one Christianity for those who pray according to the Rule Book and another for Those Who Don't. It's not beyond the realm of possibility for Man to live by Christian principles (Charity, Mercy, Dignity and Respect) without kneeling in fawning, almost begging, supplication every fifteen minutes, or believing in an Invisible Man in the Sky who is All-Powerful, but who managed to create people with all their flaws and imperfections. Christ did not demand that people commit the Scriptures to memory in order to recite them so as to torment his detractors, like it's some kind of competition for a Seat in Heaven, nor did he demand that anyone kneel to him, begging not to be struck by lightning, burned to a cinder, or for the sake of his hockey team's playoff fortunes.

Christ, deliberately, chose the Scum over the Peacock-strutting-Pious, and not because the Scum was more worthy of some higher form of mystical "Justice", but because they were denied the same spiritual rights and comfort that Judaic Law reserved for those who were 'in the club' (those not barred from the Temple as untouchables), or those who could pay for the privilege, or even just those who learned the Secret Handshake. He chased the Moneychangers from the Temple because they sold salvation or enforced an orthodoxy which ostracized rather than included; much like Luther would later nail 95 Theses to the Church Door; salvation is not for sale, nor is it restricted to a particular caste.

Salvation is for everyone who lives his life by the mantra of Jesus: those who love, those who do good works, those who try their best to avoid the Worst of Sin (recognizing that Sin is inevitable no matter how we try to avoid it).

As for the myth part; anyone with the ability to read and who takes the time and trouble to look these things up will observe that the story of Christ -- Conceived by Divine Grace, born in humble circumstances to a Virgin, who came to bring the Light of Truth, Justice and Eternal Life to the downtrodden, but deserving, in an Apocalyptic Battle Between the Forces of Good And Evil -- is the ancient Cult of Mithras (a Persian Sun Deity) attached to an actual historical figure. Exactly the sort of thing a 4th Century Roman (like Constantine) could be expected to swallow hook, line and sinker.

Who is Jesus, ultimately? I don't pretend to know. He's certainly not the first man of his age to claim to be the Messiah (in those days, Messiahs came out of the woodwork frequently enough to set your watch by), and he certainly wasn't the first to preach an more-inclusive form of Judaism (as a unifying force, a necessary prelude if the Jews were to throw off the yoke of Roman domination). But these things most certainly made him a revolutionary in the eyes of the Romans and their Pharisee puppets.

In Roman times, Revolutionaries most often got themselves crucified.

But, there is no doubting that the Christian Way is as good a system for peace between human beings as can possibly be conceived. Anyone who has an argument with the premise that all men are brothers (we're all in the same boat), and that we all have a responsibility to one another, is probably delusional, or a liberal democrat.

You can stop sending me passages from the Bible, thank you. I attended Catholic Schools just about all of my life, and I probably know them better than most of you do.

Monday, February 15, 2010

Okay, I have to say this because apparently no one else will. I will get another mailbox full of hateful shit, and quite a few cries of "RACIST!". However, in my defense, it's only racist if I hate black people; not if my purpose is to point out a relevant, historically-provable dialectic, or to suggest there just might be some correlation between the elevation of a black-liberation/socialist political agenda to national prominence, and declining national status.

Disclaimer: I am NOT a professional historian or political scientist, so the theory will have a shitload of holes in it. Take it for what it's worth. I could be seriously wrong!

Barack Obama is simply the latest in a long line of black men who have either inherited or seized political power in what was once a stable, wealthy and democratic state. Through the application of a mix of misguided policies (most the retarded stepchildren of the most dangerously socialist minds in human history), and a misbegotten sense of personal grandeur, these men have managed to take a situation in which they were viewed as a savior, a liberator, a symbol of national pride or unity, and turn it into the biggest pile of shit imaginable.

Barack Obama's attacks on Wall Street have nothing to do with correcting fundamental economic injustices. His attempt to transform the health care system into a government run lunatics asylum has nothing to do with the unfairness of the insurance system, or promoting better health for all citizens. Just like Obama's Cash-for-Clunkers and Mortgage Renegotiation schemes had little to with 'saving' GM, or keeping people in their homes. These are all about spreading cash around to those who are most likely to be unable to afford insurance, hold a mortgage that they can't afford, or who don't often get the opportunity to buy a new car; black folks.

All of Obama's policies, no matter what they're supposedly targeted at, or ostensibly for, are just the payment of Reparations for Slavery. There will never be a bill entering Congress with the words "Reparations" in it. The Word "Reparations"will never be used in public discourse. However, the effect is the same; huge wads of cash will be taken from the productive by taxes, fees, penalties, regulation and any other euphemism you can think of, and sunk into "programs" that deliberately target politically-favored groups.

This is the dynamic at the root of almost every collapse of every African "democracy" you can name. If he succeeds, Barack Obama stands to become;

Robert Mugabe in a better suit.

Idi Amin, sans 300 pounds and the taste for cannibalism.

Kwame Nkrumah, only with a greater strain of kleptomania and a wealthier nation to plunder.

Nelson Mandella, only with a teleprompter AND an even-more annoying wife.

The British Empire left 50 democracies in it's wake, many of them in Africa. How many African nations would you consider democracies today? Are they the sort of place where secular rationalism and the practice of free-market economics have produced well-fed, technologically-savvy, well-educated and productive populations, or did their combination of tribal politics, redistributionist claptrap, cries of victimhood at the hands of White Colonial Overlords (even decades after the White Colonial Overlords were either gone, dispossessed or dead, we're still hearing about the legacy of colonialism) lead them to make serious, and altogether avoidable, mistakes? Mistakes that resulted in the deaths of millions, the stagnation and degeneration of national economies, the wastage of natural resources, the siphoning off of national wealth and international aid, and which made poverty and suffering endemic.

I know; it's Black History Month (ever notice how Black History Month is the shortest month of the year? I wonder...), and I do not wish to give the impressionable youth who may be reading this that everything they've learned in their state-run Enstupidation Center....errr...School...about the Divine Status of The Anointed Obama is a load of utter horseshit (hopefully, they receive just enough education to eventually figure this out on their own...one day). I'm simply pointing out the history of countries that have been handed over to by black men blinded by Marxism and an inflated sense of self. And yeah, I know; the United States is not some malaria-infested swamp in a place without running water, electricity or toilet paper. But President Obama brings us one step closer every day with the way he and this Congress are spending money they don't have.

The problem is leftist ideology and the psychology of the man who champions it.

To be fair, there have been countries led by White Guys who also espoused leftist ideologies that have also failed spectacularly, like Nazi Germany and the old Soviet Union (which despite it's own abject failure, still managed to survive long enough to export all that garbage about proletarian revolution -- the very thing the Russians themselves abandoned soon after their own revolution -- all over the world, especially to Africa. Along with 50 million AK-47's).

Does this mean that I believe Barack Obama is a bad man? Does it mean that I believe that a black man is incapable of leading the United States? No on both accounts. I'm only pointing out that the combination of black dude steeped in racial grievance, plus radical-Marxism (semi-intellectual sludge broken down into short, repeatable slogans for easy use by the really dumb, and emotionally-unstable, but with as much substance as Jell-O) usually spells disaster.

It's probably a good thing that Obama finally called for "bi-partisanship", but not for the reasons most pundits and flapping rectums will give you when explaining why he suddenly needs republicans. Perhaps President Obama -- out of sheer political necessity -- has accidentally stumbled upon that which might possibly bring him a few more restful nights; moderation. It'll be an enforced moderation, certainly, but it'll be one this country will need if we're not to become another Zimbabwe or Rwanda.

Sunday, February 14, 2010

For those of you who gave me holy hell over my remarks on the subject of a lunatic fringe within the Tea Party these past two weeks; I seem to be vindicated. It's being noticed elsewhere. A pattern is beginning to establish itself and you can no longer hide, be you a lunatic of the Left or Right.

Those of you who filled my e-mail in-box with vicious, unadulterated bullshit -- with The New Testament appended -- can now either kiss my ass or go fuck yourselves. You've been outed. I still support the ideals of the Tea Party movement, but if they don't start weeding some of these mental cases out, it'll be a much tougher sell in the future.

While I was reading that, though, I was struck by the thought that, hey, this is the way to ruin any guy's life -- not just the ones in uniform.

As a single man, I can tell you that one of the reasons I haven't been to the altar yet (despite wanting to go there few times) is that most women of my acquaintance are very much like the woman who dumped her soldier-husband by U.S. Mail; many women nowadays are selfish pigs, who can't find their own asses with both hands and a flashlight -- on a good day --mostly because they are possessed of the most infantile notions of what life is about, and how it's supposed to be lived. Even the ones who you would think are independent, intelligent, have it together, suffer from the "I'm supposed to have it all" disease.

Your job as a man is simply to provide for her every whim and peccadillo, even when she says it isn't. You are expected to interpret her moods, gestures, grunts, groans and itches in a way that isn't even made clear by verbal communication, and if you don;t, you' re some sort of cad. She is not expected to make any sort of meaningful effort on your behalf because having the gall to actually ask for something you should be entitled to as a matter of mutual respect is somehow demeaning to her (the Feminists said so), perhaps even abusive. She's allowed to be a complete bitch, and it's your job to just suck it up and deal (she's come a long way, Baby!). She's to be kept in a fantasy bubble where real life is not supposed to invade -- especially not if it means a genuine hardship, or even minor inconvenience) to them. "I don't need no man..." is a common refrain....until they need DO a man; To pay their bills. To keep them in bonbons, pedicures and breast implants. To do something about her kids because their Real Father won't (and what a winner he was! His kids are usually so ill-behaved, spoiled or retarded that their birth certificate probably reads "Random Sperm Donor" under "Father's Name") To buy them the biggest dream house with the biggest, most-modern kitchen that will never get used, or just to buy them shit that they can stick in their girlfriend's faces.

You're supposed to be Deepockets-Supportive-Sugar-Daddy-Ken to her Entitled-to-Everything-But-Free-of-Responsibility-Barbie.

The worst aspect of the modern relationship is the strange need some women have for drama. Constant and of any sort. The more ridiculous and avoidable, the better. Even if they have to create it for themselves. It's like a drug. Where do they get this idea that life is their own personal Reality TV Series, with them in the starring role, and that everything within it should be subordinated to that premise?

When you have women spending literally hours a day watching Lifetime television, Oprah, Reality Television, reading Cosmo, People, Us -- some women are literally patterning their lives by what they see and read, not realizing that what they are witnessing are the exceptions and not the rules -- not to mention the constantly-available, instant self-indulgence and gratification of New Media like Twitter and Facebook -- you can now scream every intimate detail of your life to millions, laboring under the presumptuous idea that any of them care; they're too busy screaming about their own bullshit to actually care about yours. It's no wonder that regular guys never get a decent chance anymore; we're either chased away by the manufactured drama, we're turned off by a totally self-absorbed bitch, or we can't provide enough to brag publicly about.

And no, it's not just the young girls who are like this. I can't tell you how many women in my own age bracket I've met(late 30's-mid 40's)who are precisely like this.

It's already bad enough that if you're a bachelor at my age (42) that your prospects are already limited to the thrice-divorced, the surgically-preserved-and-Botoxed, the battle-scarred, the Clingy-and-Needy, the Desperate, and the Freeloader. It gets infinitely worse when the only role you have in a relationship is to be just someone to talk to...about herself...all goddamned day. That sort of conversation is always boring, absurd, and takes place on the junior-high school level.

But if we can evoke an even more horrible vision; if there is nothing more annoying than the selfish woman who merely expects to be protected from real life, it is the truly-frightening spectre of one who enters a relationship fully expecting to be treated like shit, only to find that she can't handle it when she's treated even halfway decently. This breed of complete lunatic is notable for shitting on you for no for reason she can explain without the Academy Award-winning Pyscho-performance. It's as if all the crying somehow makes it all logical, even though it isn't. You are held responsible for everything any man, anywhere, has ever done to her, and you get to pay for all their sins. This sort has a psychodrama that goes on inside her head. Her own thoughts prey upon her and she enters a state somewhere between half-bewilderment and half-panic which puts them in a state of total mental and emotional constipation. In the meantime, you (the Man) think everything is just dandy...until her Mental Ex-Lax begins to kick in. Here's the process:

1. You've just met:He hasn't treated me badly....yet. In fact, he's been a perfect gentlemen. He shows me some respect, he treats me as if I'm actually a human being. Perhaps he's just hiding his flaws? Well, eventually, those will become apparent, and then we'll see if he's really this good or is just on his best behavior...

2. A Few Weeks Later:I haven't seen much in the way of flaws. Okay, his sense of humor can be childish, sometimes, and he's enthralled by hockey, which means he can actually forget I'm here for a whole three minutes at a time...I don't know about that. Still, He's been very understanding. He's actually listened to me, and given me advice or opinions whenever I've asked for them. He hasn't criticized me, even though I have practically begged him to. There's something wrong; He must be hiding something, some tremendous secret that will make this all too good to be true. It must be something terrible, indeed, if he's going through this much trouble to hide it! I can't even piss him off and evoke the truly vile emotional response that I really crave -- no matter how hard I try!

3. A Few More Weeks Pass:He's been Prince Charming. This is really getting too good to be true. I'm starting to get scared, because I haven't found anything terrible about him or his behavior. There must be something wrong with him. He must want to treat me like a dog. The longer this goes on, the more terrible I'm convinced The Secret must be. The longer I wait for this other shoe to drop, the more frightened I become. He might be a ticking time bomb. I know; I'll start breaking his balls and changing on him, just to see if he'll notice and to evoke some sort of response. Let's see what turns up...

4. A Year Later:I've tried to start arguments. I've tried to disappoint him. I've pushed all the buttons I can think of. Yes, he got angry when I expected him to, and expressed interest when I thought He might, and perhaps even a bit perturbed when you could expect that, too. But he seems really patient. Even when He's rebuking me, he does so respectfully and patiently...Patient?Oh my god; He's a mental patient!He must be; no man could be this good without being crazy! Have I been dating an axe murderer? I have to find out! Maybe there's another button to push? If I push it, maybe I'll get him to show me the stark-raving lunatic woman-batterer and serial adulterer that I know he really is...

5. Some Years later:Oh my god! He asked me to marry him! This is too good to be true. I'd better break up with Mr. Wonderful before he rapes and kills me, like that woman on the Movie of the Week. I'll make up some bullshit excuse. I know...I'll tell him that"I Need space"or that"I just don't feel it anymore..." If I cry and babble enough, maybe He'll just get frustrated, stop seeking honest answers, and just go away...

6. Epilogue:She did it. She broke up with him, even put on the Performance of Her Life. The Self-fulfilling Prophecy that there is no Good Man out there, has now been completed. She has made it so; she chased him off, she tried his patience, she deceived him about the true state of her feelings. She drove him crazy while driving herself crazy. She can now complain to her girlfriends:"there's no good men out there...", and they can sit around getting fat, drinking margaritas and giving each other sympathy they don't even really feel, petty, jealous bitches that they are. A few years later, she'll call Him, and beg for forgiveness -- he'll do it, because he really was in love with Her --- and then she'll dump him all over again for an even dumber reason.

And then a year after that, the process repeats itself again...she expects to be forgiven. It's not as if He could have found a better vagina someplace else, is it? This is what Feminism and the Media have created truly Clueless and Seriously Messed-Up Chicks that are hardly capable of any human feeling whatsoever....except self-pity and conceit.Writing "Dear John" letters or dumping a man for no other reason than that he didn't meet your very worst expectations, or conform to your never-ending-self-destructive internal monologue of tour-de-force bullshit, takes exactly the same sort of stupid and selfish woman.

I have some sympathy for the men in uniform who get treated this way, I really do, but you know what? This happens every day; the only reason is seems worse is because this particular woman took an extremely weaselly, and unusual, way out; she got her divorce, in effect, courtesy of the U.S. Postal Service. Gutless little bitch. But guess what? This phenomenon --Crazy-Ass Females -- that ain't exactly new, or shocking.